Codex entry: Caridin's Journal
} |excerptonly = } |name = Caridin's Journal |image = Caridin forging the crown.png |px = 270px |number DAO = 193 (+1TSP, +6WK) |category DAO = Books and Songs |location DAO = Book in Ortan Thaig near the altar of sundering |see also = Character: Caridin |appearances = Dragon Age: Origins |trivia = * Despite the dwarves giving little credit to the Chantry's teachings and having no particular story related to the origins of the darkspawn, Caridin seems to believe the Chantry's version. |text = 940, 45th day, 5th year of the reign of King Valtor: I have done it. The vision the ancestors gave me has come to fruition. Today a man sat up from my forge, a man of living stone and steel. I called him golem, for the legend of those great statues animated by the dead. They are our future and our salvation. 940, 60th day, 5th year of the reign of King Valtor: It is a horrific process. Not every man could do such a thing and survive with his mind intact. I am honored that the ancestors believe I have the strength to bear this burden and forge Orzammar's defenders. Nothing so great may be achieved without sacrifice. Nor may stone and steel walk without a spirit to animate them. 940, 73rd day, 5th year of the reign of King Valtor: I have asked for volunteers. Some few answered, men of the Warrior Caste, younger sons with no property, no chance for marriage. They want to defend Orzammar from the horrors these humans have unleashed. They want to live forever in a body stronger than the finest armor. They do not ask to speak with those who have gone before. I have put off saying this, even in these pages. But I must say it now. My golems will be powered by their deaths. These brave warriors come to me, naked as the day they were born. I dress them in a skin of armor, so large it makes the burliest look no more than a babe, the anvil their first and final cradle. We are surrounded by a mile of earth on all sides. No one hears the screams as I pour molten lyrium through the eyeholes, the mouth, every joint and chink in the armor. They silence quickly, but the smell lingers, just a trace of blood in the greater stench of hot metal. I must work fast. The armor is malleable now, as I shape it with hammer and tongs. It is not long before it moves beneath my hands, writhing and twisting with every blow. It speaks again now, a low moan, but I have learned to tune it out. I can afford no error in this craft. There can be no melted slag blinding the eyes, nor an unhewn bit of granite shackling the leg. They groan at my work, but would they rather be broken, crippled? Those I have spoken to tell me of the pain, but could they see themselves, they would see perfection. ''--From the journal of Caridin.'' |further info = Console entry (requires getsetplotflag): cod_bks_caridinsjournal 0 1}} ru:Кодекс: Дневник Каридина es:Entrada del códice: Diario de Caridin Category:Dragon Age: Origins codex entries Category:Dwarven lore and folklore (codex)